Secular religion and social reform: Felix Adler's educational ideas and programs, 1876-1933

This is a study of Felix Adler's educational ideas and programs created between 1876 and 1933 in connection with his religious institution, the New York Society for Ethical Culture. Influenced by Reform Judaism (which he rejected), social conditions in New York City, and the ideas of Immanuel Kant, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Darwinism, Adler created a secular religious movement emphasizing the responsibility of people to help others, and to improve the world in which they lived. The dissertation examines Adler's Free Kindergarten, the Workingman's School, the Ethical Culture School, the Summer School of Ethics, and the Fieldston School, all of which were shaped, to various degrees, by his religious ideals.; Adler is placed within the context of educational reformers, academics, and social settlement leaders (including John Dewey, Jane Addams, Lillian Wald, and Charles Beard) who were influenced by secular religious beliefs as well, and who, along with Adler, brought social-reform oriented goals into American public schools. Social studies curriculums and the broadening of the responsibilities of schools to include kindergartens, free lunches, medical services, adult education classes, and summer programs were the result.; The dissertation describes Adler's role in the American social settlement movement through an examination of John Lovejoy Elliott---Adler's assistant and successor at the New York Society, and also the founder of the Hudson Guild. Adler's increasing interest in the reform of American higher education is covered as well. He was an advocate of the new university movement, a critic of the traditional four-year college, and he proposed a system of "pre-professional" high-school level schooling.; The significance of this study is that it offers a revision of standard educational histories by showing that religion, albeit a progressive, secularized strand, had an important impact on American education into the twentieth century. The study also provides incite into contemporary educational policy, particularly the notion of citizenship education. Moreover, it tells the story of an extraordinary individual who played an important role in turn-of-the-century New York City social reform.